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29 tweets,
6 min read
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Trump: "I pardoned somebody named Scooter Libby. A lot of you don't know who Scooter Libby is." He says he consulted Rep. Liz Cheney about whether he should pardon Libby, and she said yes. (Libby was her dad's chief of staff.)
WaPo has a good fact-check on this "toilets" claim (hat tip @rizzoTK). Short version: people were asked about toilets on the long-form census from 1960 to 2000, and the American Community Survey did until 2015.
Trump is Sir-repeating his nonsense about Twitter making it hard for people to follow him: Trump: "...technologically, I would think: I'm OK. Just OK. But I'll tell you, a lot of bad things are happening. People come up to me: Sir, we want to follow you; they don't let us on."
Trump says he's "much hotter" than he was a few months ago, so how come, a few months ago, "it used to take me a short number of days to pick up 100,000 people" on social media, but now "it's I would say 10 times as long?" He attributes this to nefarious activities.
The president is in the middle of a long monologue about how he is not gaining as many social media followers as he used to. He is baselessly suggesting that there is a conspiracy.
Trump on his number of followers on Twitter: "I used to watch it: it'd be like a rocket ship when I put out a beauty. Like when I said, remember I said somebody was spying on me? That thing was like a rocket."
Trump says his social media following used to just go up, but now it's like "up, down, up, down," and even when it goes up, "it goes very slowly," and "sometimes it comes down substantially," and he doesn't know what's going on.
The president says "a lot" of people buy Twitter followers, but "I don't want to do that. Because first of all: if I did it, it's a front-page story all over the place."
Trump on important policy he has announced on Twitter: "I'll go, 'Watch.' Like, I did Golan Heights. I gave Israel the real credit over - and, you know, Golan Heights and Israel, very important. But I gave representation and the strongest form of the Golan Heights, Israel."
Trump says his tweets get quickly onto TV, but "moreso Fox" than CNN, but CNN will do a segment "if I have a spelling deal," such as misspelling "the." He says he's now "very, very careful" with spelling (???), and "I'm actually a good speller" (no).
The president: "I'm actually a good speller, but everyone said the fingers aren't as good as the brain."
Trump is bragging about how big movie star Arnold failed at The Apprentice. He says he was asked if he'd rather see Arnold succeed or "die," and he said, "I think I'd rather have him die at it," even though he'd profit financially if Arnold succeeded.
Trump is repeating his usual nonsense about how he sees media outlets stop rolling when he criticizes them at rallies. I've documented multiple cases of him making this up -- he points at the cameras in back of the room and tells people he's seeing something that isn't happening.
Trump invites up Diamond and Silk and gives them a hug, saying, "I love them." He says the First Lady said, "I see these two beautiful women, African-American, incredible women, that are on television. This is two years ago. She was before her time."
Trump says he's calling for "a big meeting of the companies" in "a week or two," and "they have to be here."
A fly flies near Trump's head. He dodges and whacks at it. He says, "How did a fly get into the White House? I don't like flies. I don't like flies."
Trump says "there's a word called communism," and he says the Democrats are "beyond socialism." (The Democrats are not communists. Bernie Sanders is a democratic socialist.)
Trump repeats his false claim that there were about 20,000 supporters outside during his rally in Orlando. Almost nobody was outside.
Trump falsely says that a Joe Biden early-campaign crowd reported at 600 people was actually 150 people. It was 600 people.
Trump falsely says that all of the Democrats were "in favor of a wall." Some of them, not all, voted for fencing in the Secure Fence Act, which Trump himself has said was for something much different than his wall, calling it "such a little wall" and "such a nothing wall."
Some underlying comedy here is that there are lots of conservative complaints about social media companies but Trump keeps talking about just one: how they are supposedly crimping his follower count (they aren't).
Trump: "There's no doubt in my mind that I should have millions and millions - I have millions of people, so many people I wouldn't believe it, but I know that we've been blocked, People come up to me and they say, 'Sir, I can't get you. I can't follow you.'"
Trump: "We're the elite. They say they're elite, you know, do you ever hear this? Hey, I live better than all of 'em. Great education, the greatest houses, the grea - I guess I'm not elite. They live, like, in the basement of their mom's home. Their arms are this big (small)."
Trump was mocking the arm size of Antifa members, it turns out. He says they are only willing to punch his supporters who are not physically imposing, and they won't mess with Bikers for Trump.
Trump says fakers are now using his phrase fake news, which he deserves credit for; he scoffs at people who note it was coined years ago. He says he was watching CNN and "they go, 'fake news media has reported...'" (If anyone knows what he is talking about, please enlighten me!)
Trump says people are being banned from social media for no reason, then adds: "In all fairness, some of you I can almost understand. I mean, some of you guys are out there. But even you should have a voice." He adds, "I mean, it's genius, but it's BAD."
This strikes me as semi-notable -- Trump semi-empathizes with social media companies' decision to ban certain people, calling their content "out there" and "bad."
Trump is making another speech shortly, about the census.
